Reconstruction of the burial shaft, showing the queen's retinue and the ox drivers (1928)

Height: 7.000 cm
Length: 19.700 cm
Width: 11.000 cm

ME 121344

Room 56: Mesopotamia

Gold bowl

From Ur, southern Iraq
About 2600-2400 BC

From the 'Queen's Grave'

This gold bowl comes from the Queen's Grave in the Royal
Cemetery at Ur. It was found in the main tomb, a rough stone
chamber at one end of the pit. The chamber contained the body of a
woman and her two female servants, surrounded by extraordinary rich
material. A cuneiform inscription on a cylinder seal found close to
her body identified the woman as Pu-Abi (formerly read as
Shub-ad).

The bowl was found very close to Pu-abi. It is made from beaten
gold with small tubes of gold attached to the sides by brazing (or
hard-soldering). Through these lugs, two strands of gold wire,
twisted to give a cable effect, have been threaded to form a
handle. The excavator Leonard Woolley found a silver tube inside
the bowl, which may have been a drinking straw. Depictions on
contemporary cylinder seals, such as Pu-abi's own seal, show
figures drinking through straws. Wine and beer were widely drunk in
ancient Mesopotamia.